Twas A White Christmas - And A Cold, Slippery One Too

December 26, 1985|The Morning Call

Old Saint Nick arrived in the Lehigh Valley yesterday riding a blast of frigid Canadian air that left Christmas revelers and crews who worked ice- slicked roadways throughout the day wishing that Santa had dropped an extra pair of long johns under the tree.

And while it wasn't quite like the White Christmas scene from "Holiday Inn," there was even a dusting of snow to put a cap on yuletide celebrations.

Karl Loeper, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service at Allentown-Bethlehem-Easton Airport, said yesterday's bone-chilling weather was caused by "a very cold high pressure system that slipped in out of Canada. Winds in the upper atmosphere took a severe dip to the south and dragged all the cold air out of Canada onto us."

The Christmas Day high of 38 arrived at the stroke of midnight and began a daylong slide to 17 by early evening. Loeper said the downspin was expected to continue with the mercury dipping to 12 at midnight and hitting 5 to 10 degrees by sunrise today.

Temperatures bit a little deeper yesterday because "a pretty good breeze all day long with gusts up to 30 miles per hour drove the wind chill factor down to minus 15 and minus 20 at times," Loeper explained.

Although yesterday's cold was below normal, Loeper said temperatures would have to fall below zero to break records.

About a half inch of snow fell after a Christmas Eve rain developed into a Yuletide snow at 1:10 a.m. yesterday and continued until 7 a.m.

Loeper said accumulations varied quite a bit throughout the area from a high total of 4 inches in the Poconos to "next to nothing in Philadelphia."

But the slight accumulation kept Allentown and Pennsylvania Department of Transportation road crews out throughout the holiday, salting and cindering local thoroughfares.

"The roads are very bad. We've had lots of accidents; minor ones, fender benders. People couldn't stop at intersections and stop signs. Some wound up in ditches. It's mainly the side roads throughout the Lehigh County," said a dispatcher for the Lehigh County Communications Center at about 8 p.m.

"PennDOT and some township officials are telling us that it's so cold the cinders and salt aren't taking any effect. We've been telling radio stations to advise people to stay off the roads."

Lou Guerino, superintendent for the city's snow emergency department, said about seven trucks have been battling icy conditions on secondary roads since midnight Tuesday.

Noting "the secondary roads really slicked over because of the hard freeze," Guerino said crews were expected to cinder through this morning's rush hour traffic.

PennDOT crews, according to assistant county manager George Cole, salted and cindered side roads throughout the county since 4 a.m. Christmas Day.

The men, as well as day-shift personnel who were being brought in at 4 a.m. today, were also expected to work through rush hour.

Both Guerino and Cole cautioned early morning drivers to leave earlier and drive carefully this morning.

There's no respite from the cold in sight today, Loeper said, and "we're looking for snow tonight but not enough to get excited about -something like we just had."